Posts Tagged ‘October’
Andrew Jackson Downing
A Founder of American Lanscape Architecture Today is the birthday of Andrew Jackson Downing, who was born on this day in 1815. Downing was an American horticulturist and the author of The Fruits and Fruit Trees of America, which came out in 1845. He also served as the editor of a magazine called The Horticulturist. Regarded as…
Read MoreWoodbines In October
by Charlotte Fiske Bates As dyed in blood, the streaming vines appear, While long and low the wind about them grieves; The heart of autumn must have broken here And poured Its treasure out upon the leaves. As featured onThe Daily Gardener podcast: Words inspired by the garden are the sweetest, most beautiful words of…
Read MoreCorn and Grain
Wiccan Harvest Chant Corn and grain, corn and grain, All that falls shall rise again. As featured onThe Daily Gardener podcast: Words inspired by the garden are the sweetest, most beautiful words of all.
Read MoreLetting Go: Garden Writer Elizabeth Lawrence on the Death of her Father
“Autumn asks that we prepare for the future — that we be wise in the ways of garnering and keeping. But it also asks that we learn to let go — to acknowledge the beauty of sparseness.” Late October, 1935, Duke Hospital in Durham The garden writer Elizabeth Lawrence visited her father in the hospital.…
Read MoreAlfred Sisley
The Impressionist Landscape Painter Today is the birthday of Alfred Sisley, who was born on this day in 1839. Sisley was an impressionist landscape painter. He painted landscapes almost exclusively, and he especially loved natural, untouched scenes. Gardeners enjoy his paintings called A Garden Path and The Kitchen Garden. This post was featured…
Read MoreGeorge Plummer Burns
The Rules for Landscaping Today is the birthday of the botanist George Plummer Burns who was born on this day in 1871. Burns was the chairman of the UVM botany department. He also had served as the superintendent of the park department for Burlington, Vermont. When I was researching Burns, I stumbled on a newspaper…
Read MoreCollingwood “Cherry” Ingram
Cherry Blossom Botanist Today is the birthday of the British botanist Collingwood “Cherry” Ingram, who was born on this day in 1880. Since he was a child, Ingram was obsessed with cherry blossoms. He spent most of his adult life devoted to their cultivation and preservation. In 1926, Ingram traveled to Japan, hoping to find…
Read MoreAlice Eastwood
A Curator of Botany Today is the anniversary of the death of the Canadian American self-taught botanist Alice Eastwood who died on this day in 1953. Eastwood is remembered for saving almost 1500 specimens from a burning building following the San Francisco earthquake in 1906. Afterward, she wrote about the specimens that didn’t make it:…
Read MoreA Song of October
by Phebe A. Holder The alder wears its scarlet beads, The clematis its downy seeds, The sumach’s deepening ruby gleams, The birch in hues of topaz beams; In golden bars through leafy doors The sunshine falls on forest floors, While the warm air with balsam breathes A spicy odor from the trees. The softened light,…
Read MoreSir Walter Raleigh
Prisoner of the Tower of London On this day in 1618, Sir Walter Raleigh was executed. On the orders of King James, Raleigh had been a special prisoner at the Tower of London for thirteen years. During his time in the tower, Raleigh was allowed to tend a small apothecary garden in the courtyard below.…
Read MoreAugustin Gattinger
Pioneer Botanist of Tennesee On this day in 1908, The Tennessean newspaper reported that the botanist Thomas G. Harbison was in Nashville to collect a specimen of the clematis gattingeri for Harvard. The gattingeri clematis was regarded as a scarce plant that had been discovered by Augustin Gattinger. Gattinger was known as the “Pioneer Botanist…
Read MoreWilliam Henry Chapman
Symbolism of Trees Today is the anniversary of the death of the botanist William Henry Chapman who died on this day in 1970. Chapman was an American botanist, and his area of specialty was pomology or fruit. As a professor, Chapman taught at Cornell and later at UC Berkeley and UC Davis, where he was…
Read MoreJamie Taggert
A Risk For Plants On this day in 2013, Jamie Taggert, the young Scottish botanist, set out on a solo Plant Expedition to Vietnam. Jamie grew up with his botanist father, Jim, and tended the garden his dad founded – the Linn Botanic Gardens that overlooks Loch Long on Cove Bay in Scottland. The ancestors…
Read MoreAutumn Movement
by Carl Sandburg I cried over beautiful things knowing no beautiful thing lasts. The field of cornflower yellow is a scarf at the neck of the copper sunburned woman, the mother of the year, the taker of seeds. The northwest wind comes, and the yellow is torn full of holes, new beautiful things come in…
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